Your meaning in your looks I see.

Pray what's dame DOBBINS, friend, to me?
Did I e'er make her poultry thinner?
Prove that I owe the dame a dinner.

Friend, quoth the CUR, I meant no harm: Then why so captious? Why so warm? My words, in common acceptation, Could never give this provocation. No lamb (for aught I ever knew) May be more innocent than you.

At this, gall'd REYNARD winc'd, and swore Such language ne'er was giv'n before.

What's lamb to me? This saucy hint Show's me, base knave, which way you squint. If t'other night your master lost Three lambs, am I to pay the cost? Your vile reflections would imply

That I'm the thief. You dog, you lie !

Thou knave, thou fool, (the DOG reply'd) The name is just-take either side. Thy guilt these applications speak: Sirrah, 'tis conscience makes you squeak!

So saying, on the Fox he flies. The self-convicted felon dies.

THE VULTURE, THE SPARROW, AND OTHER BIRDS.

TO A FRIEND IN THE COUNTRY.

ERE I begin, I must premise

Our ministers are good and wise;
So, though malicious tongues apply,
Pray, what care they, or what care I?

If I am free with courts; be't known,
I ne'er presume to mean our own.
If gen'ral morals seem to joke
On ministers and such like folk,
A captious fool may take offence:
What then?—he knows his own pretence.
I meddle with no state affairs,

But spare my jest to save my ears.
Our present schemes are too profound

For Machiavel himself to sound.

To censure 'em I've no pretension;
I own they're past my comprehension.

You say your brother wants a place; ('Tis many a younger brother's case) And that he very soon intends

To ply the court, and tease his friends.
If there his merits chance to find
A patriot of an open mind,

Whose constant actions prove him just
To both a king's and people's trust,
May he with gratitude attend,

And owe his rise to such a friend.

You praise his parts, for bus'ness fit; His learning, probity, and wit:

But those alone will never do,

Unless his patron have 'em too.

I've heard of times, (pray God defend us; We're not so good but he can mend us) When wicked ministers have trod

On kings and people, law and God:
With arrogance they girt the throne,
And knew no int'rest but their own.
Then virtue, from preferment barr'd,
Gets nothing but its own reward.

A

gang of petty knaves attend 'em, With proper parts to recommend 'em.

Then, if his patron burn with lust,
The first in favour's pimp the first.
His doors are never clos'd to spies,
Who cheer his heart with double lies:
They flatter him, his foes defame,
So lull the pangs of guilt and shame.
If schemes of lucre haunt his brain,
Projectors swell his greedy train;
Vile brokers ply his private ear
With jobs of plunder for the year.
All consciences must bend and ply-
You must vote on, and not know why;
Through thick and thin you must go on—
One scruple, and your place is gone.

Since plagues like these have curst a land, And fav'rites cannot always stand, Good courtiers should for change be ready, And not have principles too steady; For, should a knave engross the pow'r, (God shield the realm from that sad hour) He must have rogues or slavish fools; For what's a knave without his tools?

Wherever those a people drain,
And strut with infamy and gain,
I envy not their guilt and state,
And scorn to share the public hate.
Let their own servile creatures rise
By screening fraud and venting lies:

Give me, kind heav'n, * a private station,
A mind serene for contemplation,
Title and profit I resign—

The post of honour shall be mine.
My fable read, their merits view,
Then herd who will with such a crew.

In days of yore (my cautious rhymes
Always except the present times)
A greedy VULTURE, skill'd in game,
Inur'd to guilt, unaw'd by shame,
Approach'd the throne in evil hour,
And, step by step, intrudes to pow'r :
When at the royal eagle's ear
He longs to ease the monarch's care.
The monarch grants. With pride elate,
Behold him minister of state!

Around him throng the feather'd rout—
Friends must be serv'd, and some must out.
Each thinks his own the best pretension :
This asks a place, and that a pension.

The NIGHTINGALE was set aside : A forward DAW his room supply'd.

This bird, says he, for bus'ness fit, Hath both sagacity and wit.